Illegal electricity connection operation successful in Mamelodi East

Residents of extension 18 were outraged after metro police removed illegal electricity connections in their area recently.

The removal of the cables, which caused a power outage, was a joint operation between the Mamelodi police, the metro crowd control team and metro electricians.

Tshwane metro spokesperson Lindela Mashigo hailed the operation as a success.

“On the day of the operation, the regional electricity team switched off the power in that area,” he said.

“Revenue protections teams removed illegal connections.

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“They removed everything from the cable, poles, transformers and other illegal equipment on the network which were impounded and sent to the scrapyard.”

Mashigo said, based on the limited number of officials from the security cluster, community members attempted to disrupt this process.

“Public order police could not be part of the operation; hence, we had to rely on our crowd control team for our electricians’ safety.

“The available forces had to respond accordingly as lawlessness cannot be condoned.”

No one was arrested.

The metro said it would continue with similar operations in the area to eradicate illegal power connections.

“The metro has identified the illegal electricity cable connections through maintenance inspections, network overload which leads to repeated area electricity outages, customer complains and as well as anonymous tip-off,” Mashigo said.

Mashigo concluded that they could not give the value of the illegal cables removed as the cables are being disposed by the scrapyard.

While some residents welcomed this move, saying they looked forward to less power cuts. Others, however, felt they were not given due notice.

They claimed the metro had “pounced” on them, turning off their power and leaving them in the dark.

One resident, Ben Mathibela, said the unlawful connections have been there for a long time between formal homeowners in extension 18 and nearby informal settlement occupants.

He said sometimes residents spent weeks without electricity.

“We have tried to remove illegal electricity cables but this resulted in clashes between the two communities.”

Portia Nkosi said many residents had resorted to selling their RDP houses because of ongoing power cuts and electricity equipment being damaged.

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